Senators plan to grill nominee

The nominee will face many questions over the eavesdropping programs.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The fate of President Bush's CIA nominee could hinge on how he justifies domestic eavesdropping programs that some lawmakers contend are illegal and started without congressional approval.
Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden should expect sharp questioning about programs he oversaw while directing the National Security Agency as the Senate Intelligence Committee begins hearings Thursday.
"There's no question that his confirmation is going to depend upon the answers he gives regarding activities of NSA," one committee member, Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., said Sunday.
'A lot of questions'
Asked if Hayden's nomination to succeed Porter Goss was in trouble, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said, "I would say that there are a lot of questions which General Hayden has to answer. He's a first-class professional, but he has been in charge of a program where we need a lot more information."
Specter, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, does not serve on the Intelligence Committee, but he wants to ask representatives of telephone companies that cooperated with the NSA to testify before his panel.
A secret NSA program, disclosed last week, kept records of millions of domestic phone calls made by ordinary Americans as part of a growing database. The agency also has allowed eavesdropping on phone calls to and from the United States when the calls involve al-Qaida and its operatives.
"There has been no meaningful congressional oversight on these programs," Specter said on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Hagel, who met with Hayden on Friday, has expressed "absolute confidence" in the general and said the hearings should provide the facts on the monitoring programs.
"The American people need to be assured that their government is, in fact, following the law, not just protecting the security interests of our country, but also the constitutional rights of individual Americans," Hagel told ABC's "This Week."
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